Somewhere I Have Never Travelled
by Chesya
Summary: Charts the relationship between a small boy and a young woman he finds while playing in his back yard.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1 - **The Little Boy who lost his Friend**

It was the first day of the summer holidays. Sean bounded down the stairs in joyous state he had so often felt, since he had found Rachel almost exactly a year ago. Nothing pleased him more than to fix her breakfast before his parents rose. 

He retrieved the soaked meusli from the fridge and began mashing into the pulp that Rachel could manage. He then made his way to the garage. 

She had been in the garage since the beginning of June, when his mother had discovered him with doll's clothes he had bought for Rachel. Since the age of three, he had longed for a female doll. This was something that had worried his mother into an aggressive repression of any signs of effeminacy in Sean. Sean wasn't an especially effeminate boy; all he had wanted was something to physical to hang a kind of imaginary older sister on. A being he had held in his imagination to fill a deficit of intimacy he felt with his mother. Her mother had died just before his birth hard on the heals of his elder brother. The combination of an unwanted second child and inconsolable grief had led to an emotional rejection of the newborn baby. Sean did not know this, but he felt it deeply. 

Somehow Rachel had managed to remain hidden during the jack-booted purge of his private bedroom realm. When the dust settled Sean decided Rachel should have another hiding place. He found the perfect place for summer. Behind a bookshelf in the garage was an old rabbit hutch. In time it could be made into an increasingly comfortable home. Books hid the hutch well, and Rachel could open and close the door and climb in and out quite easily. Window behind the hutch provided light during the day. 

Carrying Rachel's breakfast, Sean entered through the inside garage door and switched on the light. Nothing could match the desolation that was to greet him. It took several minutes for the desolate absurdity of the scene to sink in. No bookshelf, no rabbit hutch, no Rachel. He called and called her searching frantically through the detritus of family life piled and littered around the floors and walls. As his distress mounted he began throwing things and shouting, his nine-year-old mind unable to assimilate his sense of loss. 

It wasn't long before his father crashed through the door and dragged him by an ear into the hall way of the house. 

"You were always a nutter, can't you control yourself? What the hell do you think were doing?" The words seemed meaningless to Sean, the physical pain, the humiliation and the loss of his companion were all too much and fell limp into waves of sobs. "No boy of mine cries! What are you, some kind of girl? Up to your room" More desolation as he was dragged painfully to his room and the door locked behind him. All there was to do was lay on the bed and sob. Nothing could relieve the pain. 

As he tired of sobbing, Sean fell into a reverie. He was back on the day he had met Rachel. 

A loner, he was playing as usual at the end of the garden under a large weeping willow, where he needn't attract the attention of his parents or brothers. He was playing making use of bits of branches, rocks and such to create imaginary miniature worlds complete with court intrigue, plots, wars and other geopolitical interactions, when he heard the barking of a dog. Its paws were scrabbling through a hole in the fence. Annoyed he went to see what was going on. Beside the hole stood a tiny woman, frozen with fear. She then looked at the paws of the dog and at Sean, seeming not to know which to be more frightened of. Sean had never been cruel to an animal but he knew what to do. He dropped rock on the dog's paws and it immediately withdrew whimpering. He then took a closer look at the woman. She was just five inches high, her clothes were torn badly, and she covered in leaf mould. Sean would later find out that she was eighteen years old, but to an eight year old she just an adult. He tore off a doc leaf for her to wipe herself. Instead she wrapped it round self to cover her semi-nakedness. Realising her need to cover herself, Sean picked a larger leaf and picked her up with it. As he brought her towards his face she fainted. Again, some how he knew what to do. 

He carried her to his room where he had some action figurines. The army fatigues of the dolls were too large, but they would do for now. He opened the bottom drawer of his chest of drawers where his winter woollens lay relegated for the summer. He lay her limp body on a particularly soft pullover. She was kind of semi-conscious now, but didn't resist moaning softly as Sean pulled the remaining clothes off with a pair of tweezers. He then replaced them with outsized army fatigues. Warm but exhausted, she now curled up into the pullover. Sean looked at her lovingly for a few minutes an then gently closed the drawer leaving I sufficiently open for a little light and air. 

What had just happened was the impossible. Not the impossibility of the existence of five inch high human being, but the impossibility of this older sister coming to life. Reality and dreams were not well separated in his child's mind; soon it felt logical that she had come. He took another gentle look: of course she was real, and of course she had come to him.

Sean crouched by the open drawer. Before him lain curled up asleep on his favourite winter jumper was a living dream. He was too young to have sexual feelings that he could really understand, but it pleased him that she was pretty. 

Sean would later realise that he had modelled his dream on the wood fairy from Pinocchio. As a very small child at the cinema, he had shared the puppet's desolation on separation from his 'parents' and the relief at the intervention of the beautiful, magical woman.

To get a better look he grabbed a magnifying glass from his desk and began looking more closely at her. Instead of the blond older sister he had imagined, the woman's hair was the most wonderful shade of … Brown was too plain a word to describe the colour, it was kind of golden, ever so slightly reddish and at the same time none of these colours. Even as small as she was he could make out her pleasing features, a delicately sculptured slightly turned up nose, high cheek bones, a refined chin. It was a beautiful and kind face; he knew that he was going to like her. She was much better than a dream. 

He was as quiet as he could possibly be, but maybe she sensed that someone was scrutinising her, invading her personal space, because she began to stir. 

Perhaps it was a defence mechanism in times of great stress that the state of unconsciousness that had so suddenly swept over Rachel in the hands of the child that had picked her up had returned her to her normal size in her normal sized world. She was at school. Some guy was giving her a bunch of flowers. Then she was walking a dog. Nothing seemed to make sense as she came too. In what room was she in? She was lying in a bed. What bed was this and why was there no ceiling? What was the large round metal object above her? My God, there was a gigantic eye and it just blinked! She wanted to scream, but nothing came out. She was paralysed with fear. 

Sean's delight at the woman's delicate movements as she stretched and turned and looked at him, suddenly turned to horror as she let out a tiny yelp. He realised that he must be terrifying her. He quickly placed the magnifying glass back on the top of the chest of drawers. 

"I'm terribly sorry!" The woman clamped her hands on her ears at the great booming voice. Sean realised that his voice must have as loud to her as a military jet passing low overhead. "I'm terribly sorry," he whispered, "I didn't mean to scare you" 

Rachel took her hands off her ears. She looked at the giant form in front of her. Yes, it was the child who had picked her up in the giant leaf. His voice was still loud, but now much softer, imploring, not at all threatening. She remembered that he had seen off the dog, given her the leaf to cover herself and how gently he had picked her up, before she lost consciousness. If it had to be a boy who found her, at least he seemed a gentle child. 

Sean held out his index finger to Rachel to introduce himself. She withdrew, fear again taking over, could he still be trusted? Realising his mistake Sean changed to his little finger. Understanding the gesture, Rachel reached out and touched it. She felt the strange ridges and whorls of the giant fingertip; she almost had a moment to be fascinated.

"How do you do? My name is Sean," he whispered. He felt a strange electricity as her tiny hand touched his finger. 

"Rachel," she replied 

"Sorry, I didn't catch that," her voice was too tiny. 

"Rachel," she shouted. 

"Please to meet you, Rachel," His face was screwed up with concern. 

"What on earth are these, you wretched child?" She shouted pulling at the outsize fatigues "who do think I am, an Action Man?" 

He could see her smile. He smiled back with the most enormous grin.

"There's one thing you can do for me," suddenly Rachel's shout was no longer a barely audible squeak. The miracle of human relations in the oddest of circumstances began to work its magic: Rachel's voice became to Sean as mellifluous and sweet as any he had heard. "You can lift me out this place - a drawer? - so I don't feel like I'm trapped in a box!" 

"Yes, you're in my bottom drawer" 

"Bottom drawer, eh? Don't I deserve better than that?" She made Sean smile again. 

Sean could have picked Rachel up easily in one of his child's hands, but he wanted her to be comfortable. He placed a hand palm up either side of her. She sat on the palm of his left hand and lifted her legs so he could slide the right underneath her. She now tucked her legs underneath her. Sean made his hands into a shallow cup and watched as she tried to make herself comfortable. 

"Okay, you can lift me onto the top of the chest of drawers, it'll be easier for us talk there." Inside his hands, Rachel felt the warmth and give of Sean's flesh and the hard ridges of whorls on his palms. She pressed down with both hands as began to lift. There was some give, but it was like there was a stiff jelly interior with hard mobile crust on top. It was so strange to be in hands of someone so young, otherwise so small, although on reflection he may have been nearly as tall as she was at her previous size. To be so dependent on someone that should be dependent on her. Instead of fear she felt the strange frisson of feeling both vulnerable and safe at the same time as she moved through the air and he lifted her to the top of the chest.

Sean laid his hands down flat on the top and slowly moved them apart to allow Rachel to stand up. She marvelled at the texture of the giant wooden plain around her, the strange perspectives on giant everyday bedroom objects scattered into the distance. 'No time to go under now', she thought, 'the boy seems okay, it could be worse.' She stretched and stood up straight to her full five foot one? How tall was she now? Shoulders back, breasts out, look him in the eye. She was now ready to address Sean. She seemed to have some sort of control of him, she wasn't going to loose it now.

[The Present 

Sean was woken from his reverie by the lock turning in the keyhole. It was his mother. He was resigned to a verbal battering. But no, she had a concerned look on her face. 

"Sean, I need to talk to you about something," she sat at the end of his bed. 

Oh my god, what was it going to be?

[One year ago

Rachel looked at the great wide watery green eyes transfixed on her. Then, the "small" nose and ears (each must have been half her height) the chubby, rosy cheeks, cherubic lips, light brown hair in a pudding basin cut (mother, no doubt), Sean was nevertheless a pleasant looking child. "Sean isn't it?"

"Yes, spelt S-E-A-N, the Irish way, not S-H-A-U-N, as the… it means…"

"Yes, I'm sure that's all very important, but don't you think my predicament is a little more pressing?"

"Predicallment?" Sean's face began to screw up with the word he didn't understand. His mouth opened and began to make the most alarming noises. Rachel realised what was happening and turned and began to run. It was too late. Sean sneezed propelling Rachel towards the edge of the desk. She cringed at the droplets of gunk hit her hard on her back. But more alarming still she could not stop herself getting rapidly nearer the edge. She fell. 

The world rushing passed suddenly came to a halt. She was in one of Sean's hands. 

Sean, still overwhelmed by Rachel's presence and trying to understand the long words she was using had completely failed to redirect his sneeze. His reflexes were in better order and without thinking he stretched out and caught her in the palm of his right hand. His fingers closed around her in relief. Proudly bringing her to his face he said, "I saved you!" 

"Put me down you utterly wretched child!" 

His pride was wounded: "I've saved you twice now, what if don't want to put you down?" 

Rachel tried to release herself from his grip thumping his thumb with both fists. She was about to get very angry, but it was no use, she knew she was going have to take a different tack.

[The Present

"Sean, lovey," Seans's mother had that awful concerned look on her face. Terrible things went through Seans's mind: they'd found Rachel's broken body? A cat had got her? He tried to stop his mind racing over the most awful horrors. "Your father didn't mean to be so hard on you this morning." Her expression became strained. "It's just that we've being through a hard time lately." She let out a sob. "We've decided that it's going to be best that mummy and daddy don't live together anymore."

Sean could not hide his relief that this wasn't going to be about Rachel. He hated Jeff, who wasn't his real dad anyway. He let out a long sigh, but seeing the puzzled look on his mother's face changed it into something (he hoped) sadder. 

"Daddy has been clearing his stuff out the garage, that's why he was in such a bad mood." 

Jeff might have found Rachel. Suddenly things were much worse again. What would that pervert do to her if he found her? 

[One year earlier

What dignity was there to be mustered being five inches tall, wearing action figurine fatigues that were too big for you and had giant bits of gunk stuck on the back. Worst of all she was trapped in the hand of a recalcitrant child. 

'Steady on girl, you've been doing great so far. Don't loose it now. He's not a bad child. It's time to use some of those baby-sitting skills: yes, he responds to humour and firm confidence.' She'd quite often baby-sitted and mastered children bigger and potentially stronger than her, but this time…what a baby!

"Now look here young man," she looked him in the left eye – she was too close to get both in. 

"Sean," the boy said equally firmly

Rachel eyed the cherub turned monster. This wasn't going to be a piece of cake.

[The present

Sean did his best to listen to his mother for some time, but he just couldn't get his mind off the possibility of Jeff having Rachel. What would he do. He wasn't to be trusted with any living being and he definitely wouldn't like her, just because she had something to do with Sean. How would he rescue her, now that Jeff was going somewhere else. In Sean's mind Jeff now had Rachel: something had to be done. 

[One year earlier

Rachel didn't have time to take the new tack. She hear loud footsteps getting nearer and nearer. The door swung open revealing a huge new figure in the distance. Sean was quick, practically flinging her into the top drawer, closing it behind her. She was now getting used to being flung around, but not to the darkness, the heat, the sneeze-gunk soaking into the toy fatigues. She was going to vomit. The fatigues had to come off: 'I'm in clothes drawer, there must be something in here!" 

The figure was Mick, Sean's elder brother by under two years, but much bigger and stronger. 

"I saw you! I SAW you hide something in the drawer." Sean's protestations and resistance were useless. Mick had the drawer open. 

"You di-gust-ing little brat!" Mick held up the snot soaked fatigues and threw them at Sean. "You have blown your nose on Action Toy clothes" Mick left the room shaking his head and slammed the door closed.

Sean looked in the open drawer. Well, she must have been magic because she had disappeared. 

Then, he saw something move in the sleeve of one of his tee-shirts. He lifted and shook the shirt and out rolled a naked Rachel. "Oh God! how disgusting. A naked woman! Gadz Puke Yuk!" Sean slammed the drawer shut again. He was SO embarrassed. When he had put her into the fatigues it had been like tending wounded animal or something. He hadn't really noticed anything. But this was awful. He opened the second drawer, got out a hanky, closed it and opening Rachel's drawer flung it in without looking. After putting his hands over his eyes for what seemed ages he dared a peek. She had managed to organise the hanky into a sort of toga or kilt. That was much better. Both looked at each other, blushing, but the tension had evapourated. Rachel knew she had the upper hand again, even from inside a boy's drawer. 

"Well young man," her voice was firm but soft, " I think you're going to have to start treating me with a lot more respect." Sean didn't argue. "...and thanks for the lovely new dress." They both laughed.

Now that things had settled down between Rachel and her child-protector, she needed to take stock of her situation. She sensed he was basically kind and safe and they could work together, but it was clear that there were others in the house that wouldn't be quite so easy to handle. He was very young, but her best bet. 

"Are you just going to keep me in drawer, or are you really going to help me?" 

"Help you, of course," replied a slightly offended Sean. 

"We need to find out how I got like this and how to get me back to normal, but first I need a proper place to live, while we get things sorted." Sean was slightly disappointed that there was a normal for Rachel other than this, but she had had kind of normal clothes when he found her, it was kind of inevitable. She stood in a space between two piles of clothes in the drawer, but even standing on tiptoes Rachel couldn't quite see over the top. She climbed up a pile of tee shirts, but the surface was too wobbly and she looked as if she might fall. Sean had learnt his lesson and didn't grab, instead he stretched out finger in front of her to use as a rail to hold onto. How curious was the flesh of the boy's finger. Children's hands seemed hairless, but at this size each follicle produced a thick stalk, quite stiff to touch, rising and falling with waves of subtly changing colour, it was quite disconcerting to hold onto to it, the hairs actually moving her arms slightly in the process. 

She looked out over the vast canyon that was Sean's bedroom. 

"What's in that cupboard over there?" 

"Clothes" 

"And that one?" 

"Toys" 

"Do you do the clearing up, or is it your mother?" 

"It's usually me, but she sometimes sticks her nose in when I leave stuff out" 

"Now Sean, I'm not sure it's a good idea just at the moment for your parents to know about me" Earlier, her first thought had been for Sean to enlist the aid of an adult; but on reflection adults tended have things like financial problems and other hidden agendas. She imagined being sold as a freak, or for scientific research. "If you really want to help me, Sean, you're going to have to be a really good boy and keep this place ship shape and Bristol-fashion" Sean nodded. He liked the idea of exclusivity and complicity between him and his new friend. "You're going to set me up a home among you're toys." 

(The present)

Finally after an agonising wait, Sean's mother stopped. She hadn't been really interested in what Sean was thinking; but now she was disturbed by the slightly inappropriate far away look on Sean's face. "What are you thinking, Sean, lovey?" 

"Where is Jeff going?" Aw, the boy was going to miss his dad. She was relieved. She'd never been satisfied with Sean's response to Jeff. 

"He's got a flat in Bradfield." Not an easy bicycle ride, but Sean had gone further…

(A year ago)

Sean heard a faint hollow clattering sound behind him. He guessed what it would be. He ran to the bin and saw Rachel curled up at the bottom. He then leant over and scooped her up with both hands bringing some of the tissues with her. As Sean slowly brought her to eye level, she managed to get up on all fours to look at him again. Still marvelling at the exquisite perfection of this magical being, Sean studied the bemused, tear-stained little face in front of him.

"I knew you would try it again, that's why I put the tissues in the bin," Sean beamed in triumph. Rachel was still somewhat lost for words and just continued staring. "There, there cheer up little lady, come and see what I've made for you!" 

Sean took Rachel over to the toy cupboard and placed her in the roofless, plastic brick house. There were windows, but Sean had forgotten to make a door. Rachel stood surrounded by the four plastic brick walls and burst into tears again. 

"What's the matter, I haven't finished yet." 

"It's just another bldy prison," sobbed Rachel. "I'm thirsty, I'm hungry and I need the bldy loo!" 

He would normally have been upset or just plain annoyed by this, but some deeper instinct took over. Again using both hands he brought Rachel to the hollow between his chest and shoulder. One hand providing a platform for her to stand on while stroking her back with the other "There, there, don't cry now", he whispered. "Your Uncle Sean's going to look after you, sshhhh, don't cry now." 

Rachel didn't know quite what came over her but instead of thumping the stupid little brat, she just buried herself into the course fibres of Sean's tee shirt. At that moment, something seemed strangely okay about the reversal of roles and she yielded to the maternal softness of his tone loosing herself inside a catharsis of tears.

(the present)

Somehow Sean managed to hobble the bike sideways. It was just enough! The huge back wheels of the lorry came within centimetres of him, but it was clear. A head came out the window of the cab and grinned at him. The man that had nearly just killed him grinned at him. God, how he hated both lorries and their divers. Still he was clear now and on his way.

Sean calmed his new friend and placed her inside a half-filled box of tissues. He found an old eggcup he had used for something in a game of toy soldiers and placed it behind an open book creating a private place for her. 

"I'm going to fetch you something to eat and some water, you can 'go' behind there if you want. Don't worry, I don't mind" 

While he was gone, she began to make her first real assessment her situation. Rachel wondered how she could possibly survive at her new height. The child was keen to help, but was still only a child and a child beset by problems. Rachel's tears on Sean's shoulders had somehow cemented a bond between them. She could feel that it would be Sean's inspiration to surmount any obstacle to make life as bearable as possible for Rachel, although she doubted what he could do realistically to change to her size and ultimately find a way of restoring her to her former life. There seemed, however, a link from his suffering to hers. As he had stroked her in the hollow of his shoulder she hadn't at all felt dehumanised like some strange exotic pet, but genuinely comforted by a fellow being who also knew suffering. This, she hoped, would prevent her from slipping to the status of 'pet person', a state of being, even given that her basic needs were sure to be met, could lead to catastrophic loss of morale, and could easily have resulted in the insanity and eventual death which can beset any animal denied so cruelly its natural surroundings. On her part, she would be able to listen to the little boy, advise him, and accompany him in his loneliness. It was this combination of the strength of his desire to help her and the sense of her usefulness to him that made survival…well, at least worth a try…

On his return, Rachel actually felt a wave of relief. She hadn't had time to miss him this time, she'd been too deep in thought, but felt genuine gladness on his return. He hadn't done badly. He brought a peeled banana with a dollop of yoghurt on plate, some water in small shallow bowl and a glass of lemonade with two straws. To eat with he'd broken two stirring spoons his father had brought back from a fast food restaurant and had for some reason been washed and placed in the cutlery drawer. He had half solved her size, and, therefore, her digestion problems by bringing soft nourishing food, but so much had been his desire for her to share his favourite drink with him, his child's brain had short-circuited across the practicalities of someone her size drinking the gassy liquid, and from a straw! This made Rachel smile.

"Well that's a fine meal you've prepared for me, although I would like to check out your kitchen some time!" 

Sean beamed back. 

After she had eaten and drunk what she needed, Sean pushed forward the glass of lemonade. Rachel stared with fascination at the huge bubbles as they grew on specks of dust and other impurities she could see floating in the gaseous liquid. She understood the gesture and didn't want to hurt his feelings, so she decided to pretend. She pulled down the top of bendy straw, which she could just reach on tiptoes. She then placed her face over the opening. Sean thinking she was ready began to suck. The suction brought the straw upright sucking her onto the straw and lifting her clean off the ground. Sean realised his mistake, but this just made the straw 'let her go' and she was dumped unceremoniously on the ground. 

"Are you okay?"

"What do you think?" Sean's worry transformed into a giggle as he realised she was fine. Rachel couldn't help smiling too as she said, "well, if relationships are about trial and error, there's going to plenty of error we're going to have to get through."

"Trial and error?" Sean didn't know what it meant. 

[the present

'Well it's when you do something and it goes wrong, but you learn from it so you don't do it wrong the next time' Sean remembered Rachel's explanation of 'trial and error' from a year ago. He already missed the patient way she explained things to him. 'You have to admit that we're a bit of an odd couple. We're going to have to make plenty of mistakes on the way before we find the best way of working together to get me home' he remembered. What a terrible space she'd already left in his heart.

Sean had made it to Bradfield. All the other obstacles seemed to pale into insignificance after the close run in with the lorry. But, as he reached the town centre, he began to realise that he hadn't a clue where Jeff was going to be living.

'This is going to need trial and error,' thought Sean as he slowed his bike and looked at all the buildings around him, 'a lot of trial and error,'

[One year earlier

"What's that book you brought with you?" Rachel was looking at a large well-thumbed leather bound volume on the tray Sean had brought the food on.

"It's my dad's road atlas."

"Good boy," Rachel enthused. "You brought that for me? You are so lovely!!!! I'm going to kiss you"

"Yuk!" why did women always want to kiss him? He could never make a proper friend at school but all his female relatives (except his younger sister) seemed to want to pick him up and smother him with wet kisses. "Do you have to?"

"Yes, I have to. Now come on, lean over so I can reach you"

Sean leant down.

"A little further, I'm not that tall, you know."

"Oh, okay then, but make it quick."

Sean went down far enough this time and presented his friend with a giant cheek. Again she marvelled at the ever changing colour of skin tone, the hair!!??! She parted the thick down and planted a little kiss.

Sean's entire being felt a wonderful warmth. He was shocked to find that he didn't mind at all her kissing him. He blushed. 

"That wasn't so bad was it?"

"I suppose not," Sean storyboarded contempt and total lack of enthusiasm. 

"I suppose not," Rachel mimicked. "Now come on, show me this atlas and let's see where we are" Rachel was by now jumping up and down with excitement.

Sean laid out the atlas on the floor near the cupboard on the page where his town was and prepared himself to lift up Rachel again. She was so pretty standing there in her hanky toga, he knew it was very girly of him to think so, but he couldn't help it. He'd picked her up several times now but each time it became more special. 

"Come on dreamy Daniel, stop daydreaming and let me see where we are." 

Sean once again placed his hands either side of his tiny fallen angel, so she could sit on one palm and lift her legs while he slid the other underneath. He cupped the joined hands slightly and waited a moment for her to get comfortable. He lifted his hands. It seemed to take forever to carry her down to the book. He stared at her beautiful smiling face. He felt complete mastery of himself as he slowly knelt, one leg going back, one forwards to give gentlest and smoothest possible of rides down. 

Once on the atlas, Sean laid his hands flat while Rachel excitedly got off. Sean removed his hands. Rachel stood there a while staring intently on the map beneath her feet. There was a long silence. Sean started to feel slightly worried.

"It doesn't make sense," she said in the smallest of voices. "It just doesn't make any sense at all…"

Now Sean was very worried. What had seemed so easy and perfect a moment ago, suddenly became intractable. What could be wrong? What was the matter? 

[The present 

Sean had to think. Trial and error. Trial and error. A pub. Jeff was always down the pub. He stopped by a pub, the White Hart. He would need to take his bike in otherwise it was sure to be stolen and he'd never get another. Not easy through the swing doors.  
Pulling the bike backward he somehow managed to manoeuvre his way in. He looked at the length of the bar. Boozy men leant, wobbled and gesticulated at each other over a boozy hubbub, the acrid smell of hops, yeast and cigarette smoke nearly overcoming him. The men seemed to tower above him on their bar stools with their boozy wobbling and boozy faces, only half noticing him. The callous world of adults.

"What on earth do you think you are doing in here?" The voice was angry and unsympathetic. That was okay. He hadn't expected a warm welcome. The angry face from which it had come was the other side of the bar. 

"Hey that's Jeff Hanley's boy!" It was another voice. Sean was surprised to be recognised in this strange far way place.

"I don't if Adolph bldin' 'itler's boy, get 'im outta my pub"

"Someone grab 'im," said the other voice. "He lives in Stockley we'll need call his mother. He'll need to be taken home."

Sean was suddenly surrounded and then held. He kicked and screamed, but he couldn't break free. "steady on now boy, all we want to do is get you back to our mother…"

[One Year Ago

Rachel had already begun to realise that there could be additional problems about getting home, when Mick had come into the room. Initially, Sean's voice had been so low that it had been on the edge of audibility, but it still sounded like English. Mick had been completely incomprehensible to her. It was almost if he was speaking backwards. Now everything she was standing on was backwards. She could make out the names, form and roads of familiar places, but everything was positioned and written in reverse. What on Earth could have happened to her? How on Earth was she going to get home?

"What's wrong?" Sean's voice should have boomed, but it was thin with worry and concern.

"Don't worry, it's just a little more complicated than I had expected," she turned and managed a half-smile to Sean. She then turned back her muscles noticebly clenching trying to take in the absurdity that was beneath her feet.

Rachel felt the lightest of touches on her back. She felt the morale stop draining from her and begin to be replaced by the warmth of reassurance. Whatever the outcome of her struggle that lay ahead, she now realised that she was not alone, that there was now another human being to accompany her.

There was second light touch from her heels to the base of the muscles behind her calves. She knew the signal by now and sat back holding her legs up. A second giant hand slipped underneath and front of her. This time she lay on her side curling up in the scoop of the two child's hands. Sean's heart was once more filled with joy as he looked at her laying there: he too was no longer alone.

From now on neither's journey was to be taken alone. 


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2 – somewhere i have never traveled 

(Just less than a year ago) 

As she had every night since she had been installed in the toy cupboard, Rachel peered through the holes in the louvered doors. Each night she tried to understand the backwards English of Sean's mother as she tucked him in and bid him good night. Each night it was incomprehensible to her. The lights went out, but in most British houses – absurdly considering the climate and the long summer's days and in Sean's universe as well as hers – there were no shutters. It was July and nine in the evening, there would be plenty of light to see, once her eyes got used to the gloom. The wind from the closing door rushed through the louvered holes in the doors and she had to grip tight on her doll's chair so a not to be knocked over. This was her time by herself. Her time to explore… 

Before her was a piece of string, something that Sean had secured onto every shelf, so Rachel could move as freely as possible between levels in the cupboard. Despite having to breathe the 'thick air', her mobility was more than compensated for by an increase in the ratio between muscle strength and body weight. The first time she climbed this way, she'd tried keeping her toga on, but it soon began slipping off. For a while she struggled to keep it on but then gave up, letting the strange garment drop. Clinging naked, not knowing quite what to do, she wondered when Sean was going to get the doll's clothes he'd promised. 

Despite their growing intimacy, Sean still could not accept her naked, and gave her all the privacy she needed. But, at this time there was no Sean. This was her time alone and it did not matter. In fact, as she resumed climbing, it was faintly pleasurable. It wasn't just the coarse rope fibres against her body, simultaneous to the exertion of climbing, but the sense of her size in relation to the objects around her. When she considered where she was, a tiny human being hanging on the inside of a boy's toy cupboard, naked and so vulnerable, it made her tingle. She was dwarfed by his collection of toys. In fact she could have been one of his smaller toys. It was odd, very odd, but she was kind of enjoying herself. As she reached her first goal and pulled herself up onto the next shelf the tingly sensation intensified in each set of muscles as they were called upon to make the final effort. She was nearly quite overcome and she had to roll over onto her back, breathless, the tingles forming waves crashing back and forth upon the shoreline of her senses. There was no loss of sensual intensity as these gradually settled into a more gentle ebb and flow. She thought she might loose consciousness. As they subsided, she thought, 'this might not be so bad after all.' 

This pleasure had gradually lessened over the last fortnight, but it was still there and increasingly added to by a strange intellectual excitement as she found new nooks and new crannies to explore. Tonight, her increasing fitness was going to afford her, her first assault on what she thought must be the last shelf. 

She loosened the 'toga' and unwrapped herself to the now familiar quiver of excitement as she became naked. Strange, so strange! She should have felt less human at this size, the size of a toy or a petting animal as in the sense of the true derivation of the word, 'pet'; but no, she had never felt so intensely human: so small, and yet so perfect and complete amid an ocean of sensuality and danger. 

She looked at her 'bed', a third filled box of 'man-sized' tissues. She smiled remembering her and Sean painting it together. It was he who insisted that it should be decorated so as she wouldn't think of it as something so mundane and humiliating. Such thoughtfulness had afforded her the morale on which she was now building and actually beginning to enjoy certain aspects her condition. The fun they had had splashing paint around and arguing about the direction of the design was taking was an added bonus. How was it such a small boy could be so considerate? She knew from experience that there were good things to be found in the vast majority of children, something that had always given her great pleasure, but that it had to be brought out and that required at least the assurance derived from a clearly defined power balance in her favour. Here it was reversed in he most absurd proportions. When he disagreed with her he could have easily snatched the giant brush from her, or even simply picked her up and dumped her in a pot of paint. There was no philosophy of care for her to impose, only one for his instinct to allow. 

She folded the giant handkerchief, twice the size of a king sized sheet, and placed it on the edge of her bed. This was the second pillar of her now stable morale, keeping her living space as tidy as possible. This needed Sean's aid on the larger scale and reminded her that everything wasn't exactly plain sailing. Teaching this 8 year old to be tidy was no easy matter. Neither was folding the damn handkerchief and she noted that she must soon take the boy in hand if he continued to fail to provide her with 'proper' doll's clothing. 

So up she went, leaving her 'department' as she called it to explore the rest of the store. "Second floor, 'Armageddon'," she mimicked the voice of an elevator girl as she climbed onto the shelf. It was here Sean kept his toy soldiers of various sizes. She could make out one his action figurines, sitting there, legs akimbo. She clambered over a box of smaller plastic soldiers and stood between his legs. Again the strange quiver about being this size: she was only just taller than him sitting down. She leant over and gave him a kiss. "Thanks, but no thanks, Joe, I tried your clothes on once before, but it just didn't work out." 

She now climbed up onto the 'third' floor. It wasn't really the third floor of her imaginary department store, since there were shelves below hers that she hadn't explored yet. She knew she should in case she needed to get out of the cupboard in hurry, but tonight was still fun night and she enjoyed the sense of climbing upwards. More of the apparatus of war around, two incomplete and rather rusty roller skates, games, "nothing of much interest here, but perhaps we could have a game of scrabble some time", boys books and magazines, "not much to read" and plastic objects she could not define. 

"Okay, time for the undiscovered country!" She braced herself for the third climb. It was like gong back in time. The toys here were for a much younger child. Larger plastic building bricks, even some wooden blocks with the alphabet and matching pictures on, wooden railway track and a charming wooden engine. There was also a stranger building material. Coloured, transparent plastic squares with interlocking slots. Sean had left a structure half built from these. She crawled inside and became transfixed by the changing patterns of colour. Transfixed until something even more wonderful came into view. 

"Nounours," she cried. There squashed among assorted stuffed toys was the very image of her own teddy bear - one of a small group of soft toys she'd allowed herself to keep into adulthood. "Nounours, I knew you would come to save me!" she hopped over the debris and embraced 'him'. How wonderful, Nounours was now bigger than her! She was a long way from getting her arms around him and he was quite a bit more than twice her height, but he was still her very own fabulous and marvellous teddy bear. After telling him all the terrible things that had had happened to her, she punched him for not coming to rescue her sooner, then begged his forgiveness. Crying tears of joy and sadness she snuggled down into the saggy stuffing. She was about to fall into the best sleep she'd had in a long while.

Sean woke up. As usual light was streaming through his bedroom window from before five in the morning, he found it impossible to continue resting. It was before his parents and siblings got up so it provided valuable Rachel time. When he opened the cupboard door and found the bed unslept in, he didn't panic. This was the fifth time in a row now that she hadn't been lying there, all angelic like and ready to make the best possible start to his day.

"Rachel, where are you hiding now?"

"What?" came a sleepy voice from above. "What time is it?"

"If you just slept where you were supposed to sleep, you could look yourself on the watch I gave you" 

"Sorry, must have fallen asleep while I was exploring, it's very tiring being only 5 inches tall you know. I thought that children were supposed to have good imaginations."

There was no answer. Sean was looking at the folded handkerchief. "You're not in the nude again?" 

"It came off. Maybe if you'd got the clothes you've been promising for I don't know how long, I wouldn't have to climb about this place naked and you could find me just the way you want and…"

"If it just came off, how come it's all folded up and neat on your bed" Sean interrupted. Both were getting decidedly tetchy. 

"If you would let me finish it came off the first time, so I don't bother any more" 

"Well you should bother. It's not right you going around with no clothes on," he now climbed on the first shelf and stretched up to the old toy shelf and began unfastening the string. 

"Hey, hey, Sean, lovey" she lay flat to keep herself covered and stretched to stop his hands. It was hopeless, he was too strong. She then began to stroke his fingers, "hey Sean, if you leave me trapped up here I won't be able to tell you about the marvellous discovery I've made"

"Marvellous discovery, there's nothing marvellous in my toy cupboard except you" He stopped. He was intrigued. "So what then?" 

"The teddy bear you've got up here is exactly the same as one of mine" 

"What teddy bear, you liar, I've never had a teddy bear."

"Sean, Sean! Don't leave me up here!" Sean had finished unfastening the string. "There is a teddy bear up here. Look lovey, just check, you know I'm not a liar." Rachel looked over the edge. Far below was Sean sitting with his back to the open cupboard sulking. 

She had no choice. "I'm sorry, lover Ted," she whispered to the teddy bear, "I'm sure you'll forgive me." It took all her strength to move the soft toy. But slowly she got it to the edge. One final push and it was over. "Please forgive me!" she shouted after the soft toy. It seemed to take for ever for Nounours to fall. Finally it hit Sean on the head and bounced onto his lap. 

He immediately turned round and up. "How did you get a Teddy Bear up there?" 

"Do I look like superwoman? I told you I'd found it up here. Now get me down" 

Sean clambered up the shelves and grabbed her. It was so quick that she hadn't time to resist and there was that wonderful feeling of being swept off your feet by something so powerful yet benign. She was suddenly back in her own 'department'. She finished gathering round the handkerchief and stared up at Sean. He still had that sulky look. 

He must have read her bemused expression. "And don't call me 'lovey'. It's what my mother calls me."

"I'm sorry, l.., uh, Sean, it's just I like you. You know I like you, don't you?" 

"I'm sorry, too. You're not a liar." He looked at her lovingly again. "I like you, too." Closing both hands around her he then carried her to ground level, placed her on the floor and sat beside her. He put the soft toy back on his lap 

"So you'll let me call you 'lovey', then"

"I don't like you that much," grinned Sean and Rachel punched his cross-legged thigh. 

She then clambered up his hip. Sean knew from the sudden look of engrossed determination not to help her this time. She reached his lap and plunged into the artificial fur of the soft toy looking for something. She found it: a label sown into one of the teddy bear's seams. Sean took the label from her and gently lifted the bear way. She sat back round onto his thigh.

"It says 'S-E-V-A-E-R-G-R-A-H L-E-H-C-A-R' but backwards" 

"Spell out the second word." 

"It says Rachel backwards" 

"Only for me it isn't backwards"

The label had been sown in by her mother when she was nine on the eve of her first camp. She would have refused to go without it. She thought of her mother. She thought of her father and brother. Sean interrupted her thoughts.

"It is your teddy bear. What's it doing in my cupboard?" 

"If we knew that I think we would be a long way towards getting me home."

Sean's bottom lip began to quiver. He turned away.

"Oh Sean, you don't want me stay like this for ever, do you? You do want me to get home to my family and everything," It was curious, she reflected, that in the fortnight they had known each other, she hadn't spoken once of her life back home. She had wanted to protect the child from this moment since he had brought the atlas and they realised there was no easy way home for her. Or was it herself she wanted to protect?

"Oh you soppy date, you're a brave lad, you don't need to cry." She climbed his tee shirt to the top of his chest. She could just reach his cheek from her purchase and manage to stroke it. Sean felt the effort his friend was making and gently pulled her down to the hollow between his chest and shoulder where she often liked to snuggle. Now stroking her, it was the same as if he were being comforted by her.

"You've never said anything about your family before." Rachel, cheek against his chest, stared into space. She at last felt able to talk about it.

Rachel lay in the darkness. She watched the light from passing cars swing and angle across the ceiling and walls of her bedroom expanding and contracting in concert with Doppler effect of rising then falling on the engine noise. It soothed her. The windows were open allowing a light summer breeze to lift the curtains slightly and for the first time in two hours she was fully aware of the world around her. She hated having rows with her mother. Until a few months ago they'd seemed to have the perfect mother-daughter…relationship? No, it was more a friendship. Mum had been her best friend, advice and support on any number of issues passing freely between them. She just couldn't get to the bottom this rift: was it jealousy at her closeness to an other, or genuine sound advice? The worst thing was that she just didn't know. She was utterly confused. 

She wasn't stupid. She knew what or rather who was at the bottom of the sudden change. Andrezj. Wonderful, impractical, blonde flowing locks, exotic Andrejz. He wasn't overwhelmingly endowed with physical masculine charm, but there was something strong and insistent about his manner. The delicate vulnerable way he held himself, the half smile, the deep modulated tone of his voice with its hint of a Slavonic accent, the intense green eyes searching for something…Something? What? 

She had been instantly attracted, but he had made the first moves. 

"Your name is Rachel, isn't it?" The voice came from behind as she strolled down the tree-lined avenue leading out of the college grounds. Spring flowers beginning to push through after an unusually mild February. Golden early evening winter sunshine. A delicate scent of leaf mould. All were playing on her senses. She had wanted to keep on walking: she was already spoken for, there were important exams in just four months…Yes, there were good reasons to resist any proposition, and in any case how did she know he was going to come on to her anyway? Even if he did, he could be easily brushed off, what was the problem? 

"Rachel Hargreaves, you're in my chemistry class." 

She stopped and turned. She quickly realised her mistake, she should have just kept going. She pressed her books against her chest as if this if doing so would still the thudding of her heart. She took a deep breath, but all she could manage was what seemed a squeaky, "Yes." 

"You're bright. You answer Reynolds' questions well. He hasn't caught you out all term." 

"I wouldn't say that's proof of anything. I do all my assignments to the best of my ability, that's all."

"You're being modest. You're one of his top students and you know it." He reached out a hand and brushed aside some hair that had fallen across her face. 

How dare he! But, instead of 'get away you creep!' she lowered her gaze and "Thank you," came out. Worse still she could feel herself blushing. She was actually encouraging him! 

"Could I get you a coffee? You have another bus in half hour, and two more after that." 

The creep knew her bus times even down the ones that took her all the way home. Normally Neil would drive her home, but he was busy training with the soccer team. It's time to think of an excuse and get away. "Okay, I would like that." Again, the thin squeaky voice. It was as if it wasn't her speaking at all. 

Two hours later, and now in the cold winter darkness she stood alone at the bus stop. It would be at least 25 minutes before the next one, the last but one and one that didn't go all the way up the hill to her estate. What a doormat! He could have at least stayed with her while she waited for the bus, but Andrejz had had to run off to evening class. But, how they'd talked, it was if time no longer existed. Her heart almost broke when after finishing their third coffee he had interrupted her, made his apologies, paid for the coffees and left. She sat staring into space a while, trying to understand what had so suddenly and completely changed in her life. 

Realising how late she was, she pulled herself together and went outside to the bus stop across the street. Once in the cold air she seemed to wake up. Mum and Dad would be worried. She quickly dialled the number, but hung up before it was answered. She couldn't quite face the prospect of replying to her mother or father with a lie, and something told her she would have to lie, so she texted her excuse instead. 

"Rachel, what are you still doing here at this time," the voice was familiar but it still made her jump such was the depth of her reverie a she waited for the bus. "It's Neil, you silly, what on Earth were thinking about. It's not like you to be in a daze." 

Rachel was both relieved and discomforted by the presence of her boyfriend. "I, ..I needed to swat off some books that were only available for reference in the library. You know that the library in Bradfield's no good." Rachel couldn't remember the last time she had lied, let alone twice in one evening to the people closest to her in her life. And, why did she have to lie? She hadn't done anything wrong, why was she having to lie about bloody Andrejz? Who was he anyway? 

Rachel held Nounours, her teddy bear tight against her. She remembered Neil's concern for her and his kindness in driving her all the way home and covering her excuses in front of her parents. But, she also remembered the stale taste of his kiss and the feeling of wanting to squirm from his embrace when they said good bye. Were all relationships going to end like this? Awkward feelings of guilt, the emptiness left by someone that used to interest you, someone you cared about but couldn't feel anything for anymore? She should have felt joy at meeting someone she had felt such a deep connection with, but all she felt was disquiet and foreboding. She had always been such a happy girl, but something was now making her feel sad. Very sad… 

"Neil sounds like a really nice bloke"

"Thank you, Sean. I could tell you were a tactful child"

"Well he sounds brilliant. He's good at football and he's English, not like that weird Polish bloke"

"What have you got against Polish people? Have you met any? How would you like it if I called you a thick paddy?"

"I'm English, not Irish"

"That's not the point, Andrejz is English, too; but you shouldn't judge people by which country they come from, or worse still country their parents or grandparents came from." Sean looked puzzled. "How many of your grandparents are or were English? How many of the players in the England football team are really English by your reckoning?" She was now standing precariously on a purchase she had made in a fold in his tee shirt and quite taken up with ire. 'Oh my gawd,' Sean thought 'she's going to work herself up into frenzy again and fall.'

"Okay, okay, you win. Anyway it's about time we had breakfast"

Sean was getting quite good at breakfast. Lunch and Dinner were a different matter, but breakfast did Rachel okay. She enjoyed her peeled grape or mashed her piece of banana with yoghurt soaked muesli washed down with a thimble full of fruit juice then tea.

After he'd cleared everything away, he found Rachel messing about with something in the bottom of his cupboard.

"I can't leave you for five minutes can I?" Sean said in a mock parental tone and grabbed her with both hands pulling her away from the book she was trying free from a pile in the cupboard. "You're coming with me young lady," he continued deepening his eight year treble as low as he could. He placed her gently on the bed and curled round her. Rachel was speechless with rage. "I just want you to continue your story." 

The truth was that Rachel needed to talk about what had had happened. "Okay, but on one condition." Sean knew what is was going to be, "you don't do that again," they said in unison. Rachel couldn't help finding it funny, but she knew she had to maintain some sort of status with the boy and didn't show it. "Seriously, if you go around doing that sort of thing again, we'll be having a serious fall out."

Sean knew there was no physical reason why he should obey, but he knew respecting her pleased her and it felt right. "Okay, I'm sorry, I won't do it again, I promise."

"Okay then, I'll continue…"

"Damn you, Rachel," her mother never swore at her. It cut her like a knife. "It's just too months from your 'A' levels, you've got an excellent offer from university, what the hell do you think you're doing?" It cut like a knife but all Rachel could feel was rage, dead, burning mind-numbing rage. "It's that Polish boy, isn't? Ever since you met him and threw over that lovely Neil, you've been on a slippery slope!" 

It was Saturday morning, Rachel had a stinking hangover and now her mother was making xenophobic remarks about her boyfriend. It was too much, she turned round and walked out of the kitchen. "Don't you turn your back on me, young lady!" It was too late, Rachel, unshowered and in the dress from the night before was out of the front door and on her way…, well she wasn't quite sure where yet. Yes, she was in love with Andrejz, but was Andrejz in love with her? She really didn't know. How had she got herself into this mess? Then she had a flashback from the night before. 

She knew something must have been put in her drink at the club, but she had enjoyed herself so much that she didn't care. Andrejz's friend Pete, the manager of the club, had frequently offered white tablets with various designs on which she had always assumed was E. They could mess their heads up, but not her. After her third Tom Collins and well on into the night, instead of the relaxed inhibition afforded by alcohol she felt her senses strangely heightened. She felt the music penetrate deep into body, vibrating against every nerve, bone and muscle creating a kind of resounding sympathetic music inside her. A music which made her dance in way she had never danced before. She felt she was 'becoming' the dance itself, melting way into nothing but movement and emotion. 

Melting away? Around her suddenly was a forest of legs. She felt her herself slipping down. Down. A giant shoe nearly trod on her. She had to get back to the table. She ran, then she was flying through the air and being placed on the table. Andrejz and some people she hadn't met before were sitting around creasing themselves with laughter. She was shorter than the beer glasses around her. A giant hand started arranging them into a sort of pen. She was enclosed. She had become a miniature circus trick, a freak on show dancing for the pleasure of an animalistic crowd. But instead of fear she felt elation and the music deep from within: all she could do was dance, dance and dance. She had become the dance. She was the dance. 

What an hallucination! She hadn't realised that drugs could do that to you. And then what? What had happened, next? Her memory had completely gone. What had had happened, next? Her mother was right, Neil was right, there was something dangerous about Anj, something of the night. 

"I told you that you should have stayed with Neil. Was that how you got shrunk?" 

"Have you actually been listening to me or what? Was I five inches tall when I was talking to my mother? Was I five inches tall when I went out the door and had the flashback? Was I wearing a dress when you found me?" 

"Alright, alright, I've got it, but what did you mean about the dress" 

"Could drugs shrink a dress?" then Rachel's face went deadly serious. She got up. Not easy with the crater Sean's weight made in the mattress. He bent his head watching her. She wobbled and Sean steadied her as she made her way to his solar plexus. She pressed herself against him. "Sean, lovey, promise me something, will you?" 

Since it was her he decided to let the 'lovey' go this time, "What?" 

"Promise me you'll never take drugs" 

"But everyone does by the time they're your age. I've heard all about it at school" 

"You've heard and seen nothing. I've seen what drugs can do to people." She looked up into his eyes concerned and imploring. Sean wanted to plough his own furrow here, but he couldn't resist her. 

"I promise." 

Rachel sat back down onto the side of the 'crater' and stuck her feet onto Sean's belly. Trying to remembering everything was taking a lot out of her: it cut like a knife, but remember she must.

Despite numerous attempts on his part, Andrejz failed to recapture Rachel's heart. Something had happened to her that night. Something she couldn't put her finger on. Something, she didn't know where or what, had been taken away from her. Not easy to avoid someone you share lessons with, walk the same corridors with to the same beat of the same timetable, but avoid him she did. Not easy to not answer the door or the 'phone even when you had parents and a brother to shield you, but the 'phone number was changed and eventually the police called to remove him from your driveway at two in the morning. Not easy to see someone you thought you had loved being dragged into a police car and taken away, but watch him she did. No, Andrejz did not manage to recapture her heart, but her heart did not remain unbroken. 

Uncaptured, that was until the last day of the exams. Rachel was taking one of the last papers in the her 'A' level series, an extra paper in the subject she had taken mainly for fun, History. It just so happened that someone else was also taking the special paper in physics on that afternoon, something Rachel would have done had she not taken on an extra subject. That someone was of course Anj. 

When the exam was finished, they found themselves alone in the entrance hall of the college. She wanted to run, but with no other students around, she remained transfixed. 

"Please, don't be afraid," that voice, at least as penetrating as the music had been that night. 

"I'm not afraid of you, I just don't want to talk to you, that's all," she was lying, well, half lying. She _was _afraid of him, but more afraid of herself, her weakness in his presence. She turned to leave. But a hand reached out to stop her. How could such a gentle touch stop her? But, stop her it did. 

"We don't need to talk, just stay with me a while, I've missed you so much" 

'The bastard,' Rachel thought, 'how does he know what to say?' If he had given a proper reason she would have kept on walking. It was that that kept her transfixed. He just seemed to know things. 

They walked together and sat down on the wall by the old 'In' gates of the college, strangely the place she had met Neil for their first date. They must have just sat for half an hour without talking. 

"I didn't put anything in your drink that night" 

"I never said you did, it's what happened after that worries me" 

"Nothing happened, I swear. We went back to Pete's, you were pretty high, but you eventually passed out on the sofa, and that is all. We took you home and you were fine. You said good night and went in. That is all." 

All of it seemed to make sense. Perhaps the sense of something missing was caused by the drugs, and yes it could have been anyone administering the drug. This sort of thing happened all the time. Why was she accusing the man she loved? A man she was a little afraid of, it was true; but she was only eighteen, Anj was someone strange and exotic, someone interesting. She should face up to her fears. "Okay," she turned round to look him the eye, she felt herself to be the old Rachel again, strong and unflappable "now, tell me what you've doing the last two months." 

Once the ice had been broken again, they continued where they'd left off. It was as if they had never been apart. Rachel 'phoned her parents to say that she had been picked up by some friends to celebrate the end of her exams (more lying) and by nightfall, they were once again in Pete's club. 

When she returned home, alone in a taxi Pete had got for her at 4 am, her mother was waiting for her. 

So now here she was lying on her bed, simultaneously elated and sad, torn between the two people that meant most to her in the world. She closed her eyes, it was the music. There was no sound, but it was if the music was playing from inside her again, playing her as if she was a musical instrument herself. She opened her eyes something was wrong. Sure there was the ceiling above her with the car lights playing across it, but something was wrong. It seemed what? Yes, more distant. She turned on her side to get up, but instead of her legs swinging down to the floor, she continued to role onto to her front. She looked at the weave of her duvet cover. She could see every thread in alarming detail. She got up. Standing was difficult. She turned round and there was Nounours. He was taller than her while sitting down. 'It must be drugs again. I shouldn't have trusted him,' but that didn't make sense. She'd had a few drinks, but she she'd been compos mentis all night. Nothing had happened to her. The only thing to do, 'though was to find Anj. 

She walked and crawled to the bottom end of her bed as best she could. At the end she realised there wasn't a hope of opening the door. It was closed and the door know seemed to tower above her even from the perspective of the bed. She heard something. Gravel against the glass closed window. A hissing sound. "Rachel." It was Andrejz. She bounced, ran and crawled back along the bed. There were foot holes up the wooden head rest and she was able to climb up onto the window ledge. 'Andrezj, how did he know to be here?' She looked over the edge, it seemed miles down, but there was Andrejz, not looking at all like a giant below. "Andrejz get me down from here!" At that moment a gust of wind blew the curtain in. She watched it as if it were in slow motion as it came round and knocked her over. She managed to hold onto as it swung out of the window, but it was too swift a movement for her to hang on. Her grip failed and she found herself falling, falling; falling towards a bush. It was a thorn bush. She heard her dress rip as she fell through the layers of branches, but it broke her fall.

She had landed winded and scratched, but basically unhurt in the mud underneath the bush. Then there was the most enormous racket: the bending and breaking of branches above her. The foliage parted and there was an enormous smiling face. It was Andrejz's but not Andrejz's. It looked, somehow older. Then, a giant hand came through, probing and searching. Rachel was in too much in shock to resist. The hand closed around her, the warm sweaty flesh smothering her body. Yes, it was Andrejz's face. She'd never seen an expression on it like this. It was deeply furrowed and wrinkled, rough looking…it was, evil! 

"Don't struggle, my dear little Rachel, you know who I am." She didn't even realise that she'd been squirming around in his grip. 

Then there was the barking of a dog. It was Carling, the family German Shepherd. She could see it running up growing alarming large as it came closer. Dad must have not tied him up properly. It jumped from what still seemed a long way off and knocked over Andrejz. She felt his grip loosen as they fell to the floor and she was thrown several normal-sized feet forward, the thick, freshly mown grassed breaking her fall. Lord how it stunk as she got up and began clambering through. She looked round, the enormous dog seemed occupied with Anj. She knew she just had to run. She reached the path. The grooves in the concrete made going difficult but it was possible. There was hole in the fence at the bottom of the garden. If only she could reach it. Then the dog noticed her. 'Run, run!'. The willow tree. Good no grass, no cover, but easier going. There was the hole, but, but…light was pouring through it. She turned round the dog was looming larger. She had no choice, she went through it. 

"That sounds like the bottom of our garden," Sean was wide-eyed with living the excitement of Rachel's story. 

"Well that's how I got here, I went from our garden at night to yours in daytime . Let me see out of the window." Sean picked her up and took her to the open window. He placed her on the edge, still keeping his hand loosely around her. 

"You're not going to fall this time." Rachel turned back and smiled and then looked out ahead. She wasn't at all comforted by what she saw. There was a strangely familiar feel to the garden stretching out into the distance below. There were minor differences, a shed at the bottom instead of nearer the house, a hedge missing from across the middle and vegetables being grown at the end toward the willow tree. But, this was unmistakably the same garden she had left that night...but, of course, with one important difference...


End file.
